Digital Dash Swap?

[Glen4X4]

Those conversions are lookin awesome guys, are you going to put in a full length console for the message center?

 

[NICE59FORDF100]

x92, i am planning on either modifying a second gen console or building my own. I want to have the message center up a bit higher and still leave room for my aerostar floor shifter AND still keep my cup holders. But i dont mind running it like is right now
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[NICE59FORDF100]

I just did a tally in my head...when everything is said and done with the digital dash conversion, i will have 24 stock-ish buttons to play with, lol. Not counting the stereo either....

 

[NICE59FORDF100]

wow this thread got quiet. How you guys coming? Im still missing a dremal so no progress for me :-( But i did get the color change done on computer, now just need to find a laser jet printer
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[arco777]

I am still waiting on buying the EL panels I need, money is real tight but should have some extra soon.

 

[geoph1986]

This thread is not dead!!!

HAPPY HANUKKAH, MERRY CHRISTMAS, & HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE (yes I did intend to yell that, at the top of my lungs from the highest mountain). I hope your holiday season has been good to you and yours.

No this thread hasn't been abandoned. Between 2 surgeries, the flu going around the family, my main computer dieing and Christmas, there hasn't been a lot of time for this. Anyway, I now have everything mounted the way I want it in the Explorer housing. But I'm still having a backlight issue. I had a voltage inverter from an old Toshiba laptop, but while whacked out on painkillers and trying to be productive, I fried it (red goes to positive dummy).

So I went hunting through my box of computer parts and I came across a TOKIN "INVR-063" inverter from a Compaq Evo N600C. Here's my problem...I don't know which pins I need to connect power to, in order to get it to light up my CCFLs. ANYONE READING THIS, CAN YOU HELP ME? I've searched on Google and haven't found any info on testing inverters removed from a laptop. Is there an alternate inverter I could purchase for powering the bulbs? Backlighting is the only thing stopping me from moving forward on this project.

I had such high hopes of posting pictures of the cluster assembled and lit up. I will post pics of what I have if you want them now, but I would prefer to post them with the final one being a lit up cluster.

How's everyone else progressing, or has this been project been abandoned?

 

[NICE59FORDF100]

not abandoned, just no dremel, :-(.
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[jimmyfloyd]

Might have abandoned mine. Sad too, cause I have a dremel, the cluster, and two parts Evo N610c laptops with inverters. Maybe I'll put it on the back burner.

 

[arco777]

Not abandoned, just been busy and short on cash. I'll order the EL strips within the next week or two and when they arrive I should be able to finish up without too much trouble... a Limited bumper, new fogs, new grille, and headlight trim project is threatening to take my focus.

 

[geoph1986]

Might have abandoned mine. Sad too, cause I have a dremel, the cluster, and two parts Evo N610c laptops with inverters. Maybe I'll put it on the back burner.

Maybe you could help me out friend. Your N610c uses the same inverter that I want to use ("INVR-063"). There are 6 wires going into the inverter (brn, brn, org, org, grn, blk) from the LCD screen harness. Would you be willing to tell me which ones have voltage and how much when it is powered on? This would help me immensely, and since you said your laptops are for parts, I'd imagine that you're planning on stripping them anyway. Thanx in advance.

 

[geoph1986]

Update

My cluster is together, and tested. It does need to be disassembled, and have the final plexi face cut. The one that's in there now has had some holes drilled in the wrong place. I also need to install the second ccfl bulb. The inverter I have will only light one bulb brightly. If I connect two bulbs to it, they are quite dim and do not light up the cluster nearly as much as the one bulb in there now. Because of the way I have the "brain board" mounted,

the ribbon cable for the lcd displays was too short. I lengthened it with a modified 40 pin IDE cable from a desktop computer.

The backlights mount to a plexi piece that sits between the lcd's and their circuit board. To help reflect the light forward, I'm reusing the stuff out of a laptop screen. Right now these pieces are just taped in place on the plexi. Once I get a second inverter, there will be one bulb at the top and bottom of the cluster. Right now there is only one in the center, because I was excited to get it together and tested. The bulbs will be fastened with a combination of super hot glue and a couple tiny zip ties.

Here's the back of the assembled cluster, before it was placed in the housing.

It's assembled in this order:
1. Plexi face
2. Craft store black foam
3. LCD displays
4. Backlight panel
5. LCD display circuit board

The displays are fastened with 1/8" stepped metal things used for mounting mirrors on walls, and for "bolting" them in place I used a computer motherboard mounting kit. The only problem with them is that the screws are a little on the short side.The final product will use small nuts and bolts with a tiny bit of thread locker. To keep them spaced apart evenly, I made some small "T" shaped pieces placed in the gaps between the center display and the outer ones.

Here's the cluster unlit, and the plexi face has no tinting on it. I have a bunch of samples from a local tint shop, and once both backlights are installed, I'll be able to see how dark I should go. For trimming the display areas out of the foam, I used an exacto knife and the Cougars cluster face as a guide.

And here it is all lit up.

Again, this is only with one backlight and it's in the center. I'm quite happy with the relocation of the brake, highbeam, and seat belt indicator lamps. The two visible screws in the face will be painted flat black to help blend them in. I'm happy with the way this is now coming along, and I think that aside from tinting the face, this is the closest to stock looking I will be able to achieve. During the final disassemble, reassemble stage I will do the blue tint mod.

One thing that I noticed during testing, that was different from NICE59's test of the displays, is that the coolant gauge icon didn't flash, the oil one did flash, and the amp meter indicated it was charging. So I have to look into the wiring diagrams and see what's up. Also, no matter how I tried to figure out a way to have it, for me there just isn't enough room for the shift indicator. In the spring I will figure out a floor shifter.

 

[NICE59FORDF100]

SIMPLY WOW. Thats all i can say. Flipin sweet man, great job. Cant wait to get mine.
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[sport97]

That looks excellent. Its gonna be awesome the first time you take you explorer for a drive at night. Great work.

 

[arco777]

Wow! That looks amazing. You win the race

 

[geoph1986]

The race is far from over. I still have to completely disassemble, cut a new plexi face, permanently mount the ccfl's (once I get a second inverter), and do the blue tint mod. Once that is done I will tackle the wiring. The wires that need to be run in the truck (VSS and such), and the cluster install itself will have to wait until spring. I don't have a garage and I don't feel like freezing my ass off in -30 (-40+ with the windchill) Celsius for a novelty.

 

[BrianDye]

(Got your PM just now lol and read up on this)

Wow that looks amazing, I cant believe how much work it is though haha, I would never have the patience for all that! I cant wait to see final product in your explorer, make sure you get a video of it in action!

 

[energie]

i think i would have just bought one from dakota digital lol

 

[geoph1986]

i think i would have just bought one from dakota digital lol

The idea behind this project is to do it on the cheap, so that anyone can have one if they wanted it. Plus, it's a great leaning experience.

 

[turboranger91]

Hi there, this is an awesome thread. I'm the guy over at TRS who did the Taurus Digital Cluster. I was going to pull it out and do some refinements (don't have a 4x4 so I was going to move the highbeams/parking brake to the 4x4 dummy light section, among other mods), but after seeing this I may be doing something substantially different!

One thought on the LED backlighting. Before I did the Taurus Cluster I did the LED swap in my gauges. I bought several different varieties of LEDs and tested them out to see what would give the cleanest output. I ended up with these:

They have no upward facing LED, so the light you get coming up at you is what is reflected off of the back/side surfaces. I also lined the back of the cluster with aluminum duct tape (the kind that is super-reflective), which gave me extremely even lighting (the hotspot with the 45 looks worse on camera than it ever did in real life):

If I can find a cluster locally, I'll probably give this a whirl and I'll probably use those bulbs. I also used them in my Accord and had the same success.

i really like how that turned out.

 

[houstontyler]

Wow I really like the LED in the stock dash. I have to do that.